wfn.org | Cash-strapped Churches Help Intifada's Christian Victims

[JerusalemRelOrgs@aol.com]

Contact:  Fr. Raed Awad Abusahlia
P.O.Box 14152  Jerusalem  91141
Tel.  (972 2) 628.2323 / 627.2280
Fax  (972 2) 627.1652
Personal E-mail: nonviolence@writeme.com
Latin Patriarchate E-mail: Latinpat@actcom.co.il
Latin Patriarchate's Homepage: http://www.Lpj.org
"Nonviolence Homepage": http://go.to/nonviolence

By Darren Fisher, 
(first appearing in the Israeli Daily Haaretz)

JERUSALEM, 9 March 2001--With homes damaged in shooting between Palestinians 
and Israeli soldiers, livelihoods vanishing like the tourism, and the 
closures of their towns, the Christian community urgently needs help. 

But while larger churches and affiliates have dispensed many thousands of 
dollars in aid, some smaller ones are finding themselves hard-pressed to meet 
their own needs. 

Some 80 percent of Arabs employed in the tourism industry are Christian, 
estimates Father Raed Abusahlia, Chancellor of the Latin (Catholic) 
Patriarchate of Jerusalem, just inside the Old City's Jaffa Gate.  Given this 
concentration, he adds, the drop-off in tourism since October has hit the 
Christian community especially hard; many have been jobless for nearly six 
months. 

Of the Arab-run hotels in Bethlehem, East Jerusalem and Nazareth, he 
estimates around half their workers lost their jobs.  The Episcopal Cathedral 
Church of St. George in Jerusalem -- only meters from Road No. 1 on one side, 
and the Justice Ministry on the other -- runs a guest house, as do many 
church-affiliated institutions in Israel and the Palestinian Authority. 

In the wake of travel advisories issued by the British Foreign Office and the 
U.S. State Department, Cathedral Dean Father Michael Sellors says, "Insurance 
was not possible for a lot of groups and so they canceled."  As a result, 
staff at the hostel were employed only part-time over January. 

In the Notre Dame of Jerusalem Center, a magnificent Catholic hotel gracing 
the skyline beside the Old City, an average night finds fewer than 20 people 
in the 150-room building, says its director, Father Aldo Tollotto. 

"An effort was made to retain all 155 staff members at the hotel, in the 
knowledge that Notre Dame is supporting 155 families," he says.  But to do 
so, it was necessary, as of late November, to ask staff to work without pay 
one week each month.
 
The Lutheran Church, in the heart of Jerusalem's Christian Quarter, has 
closed its 45-bed guest house and 60-bed youth hostel altogether. It has 
opened only sporadically since October, on occasions when a tour group 
decided not to cancel its booking.  

"We plan to open the guest house again at Easter [in April], as we are 
expecting a group of 20 pilgrims," says the administrative director of the 
guest house, William Alonzo.
 
One way the Latin Patriarchate has sought to bring relief is to make extra 
efforts to encourage Christian pilgrims from abroad, despite the violence. 

Besides regular visits by the heads of the Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant 
churches to those in distress -- and prayer sessions by every church -- 
several groups have come to the region on solidarity visits, says Fr. 
Abusahlia.  "Not only is their presence appreciated as a gesture of support, 
but their spending helps to generate revenue to keep the community afloat." 

It is precisely the lack of spending power in the community that has rapidly 
compounded the problems faced by the Christian community:  Once incomes dry 
up, spending shrinks and the circulation of money, even among the employed, 
begins to slow.  Shops and businesses are not the only ones to lose out; 
Catholic schools in the region are also finding it impossible to make ends 
meet. 

Since the network of Catholic schools is independently run, they get no 
funding from Israel, the Palestinian Authority or Jordan, where they operate; 
they rely instead on tuition fees to cover some two-thirds of the costs of 
running the system, and make up the rest with donations, says Fr. Abusahlia. 

"Since many families can't afford to pay these fees," he says, "the Latin 
Patriarchate is finding it difficult to raise even half the running costs for 
its schools." 

At the Catholic school in Beit Jala, for example, only around $800 of tuition 
fees were collected for the month of December -- not enough to pay the 
salaries of two teachers, let alone the other 38 members of staff at the 
school, he remarks.  And with 2,000 teachers to pay across the region, the 
patriarchate faces a bill of $500,000 every month for staffing, alone. 

This year he says he expects the school system to be $3-$5 million in 
deficit. 

The tourist stay-away has affected the churches more directly in some cases.  
Several have had to tighten their belts in cases where hostels are not 
affiliated, but provide essential revenue for the whole institution. 

Monsignor Andre Bedoghlian, exarch of the Armenian Catholic Patriarchate, 
says that this past Monday night, a solitary pilgrim was staying at the 
church's guest house.  Such poor showings have left the Armenian Patriarchate 
with only enough money to keep the staff paid and the building lit, he adds. 

Mgr. Bedoghlian says St. Joseph's Catholic Hospital in Jerusalem even offered 
him an extension on the due-date for payment of his hospital bill after he 
was released last week, so empty are church coffers.  So there is nothing 
available to offer needy families, he adds.
 
In such circumstances, one of the few practical measures the Catholic 
churches can take is to help the Catholic aid organizations that collect 
money from overseas ensure that funds reach those they know most need it. 

"Ten thousand dollars a day is needed to meet the needs of all those who 
contact the office each day," says Fr. Abusahlia; the Patriarchate cannot 
afford to dole out such sums, but "the relief agencies are working on an 
emergency scale," he says.
 
Among the groups active in this field is the Pontifical Mission (based in the 
Christian Quarter of the Old City in Jerusalem), which receives money from 
the Vatican and U.S. Catholics for distribution to local needy families.  
Together with other Catholic aid groups such as Caritas, the Pontifical 
Mission has channeled funds to Christian areas around Jerusalem, particularly 
to families whose homes have been damaged by Palestinian bullets or Israeli 
artillery fire. 

Fr. Guido, director of the mission, says that since the intensified violence 
began in October, he has visited at least 100 families in homes damaged by 
shooting.  Fr. Abusahlia at the Latin Patriarchate estimates at least 160 
Beit Sahur homes have been damaged.

Much of the churchmen's attention has focused on Bethlehem and the villages 
of Beit Jala and Beit Sahour -- all to the south and south east of Jerusalem. 
 In Beit Jala, for example, "I can say with confidence that $98,000 has been 
spent by the Pontifical Mission on supporting the families there," says Fr. 
Guido. 

"We try to give families somewhere between $500 and $1000 each.  Some people 
said we should give food, but I decided against this, because if money is 
given instead, then it will be spent in stores and will go to shop keepers, 
too. It also helps to guard their human dignity." 

"Other people said we should insist that families use the money to rebuild 
their homes," he adds, "but we decided that the people themselves would know 
best how to use it.  They are the ones who are suffering, and the suffering 
is very great due to the lack of income." 

The Greek Orthodox Patriarchate, by far the largest of the churches in the 
region, has also concentrated on these villages.  Church heads regularly 
visit these areas to provide comfort and financial help to those whose homes 
have been damaged or destroyed.  Some $500,000 has been dispensed by the 
Patriarchate to Christians suffering hardship in the territories since 
November, Metropolitan Cornelios says on behalf of the church. 

A poignant example of the problems churches face is offered by Reverend 
Shemun Can, parish priest at the Syrian Orthodox Church, which backs onto the 
Jewish Quarter in Jerusalem.  By Rachel's Tomb, at the entrance to Bethlehem, 
he says, is the skeleton of a petrol station that was destroyed in shooting 
between Palestinian gunmen and Israeli soldiers at the nearby army post.  

"The petrol station near the tomb has been destroyed, and those Armenian 
Catholics who worked there now have no livelihood.  They must search for 
alternative work in order to pay for food for their families," says Rev. Can. 

"We, along with the clergy from other churches, visited families who suffered 
[because of the violence], but we couldn't do much for them, because they had 
lost so much of what they had," says Rev. Can.  

The director of the Pontifical Mission tells the same story: "We don't have 
the finances to help them rebuild their homes, but we can buy the most 
necessary items that they need.  While there is a lot we could spend money 
on, we only have so much, and if we spread it too thinly, it won't help 
anyone.  So we help those who have been bombed, the elderly, and the sick." 

Much of the Mission's work is focused on those who have been displaced. "In 
Bethlehem, the whole quarter around the [Israeli] military compound has been 
evacuated," says Fr. Abusahlia of the Latin Patriarchate. 

"Many families from Beit Jala have also gone to live in hotels or stay with 
relatives.  Fifteen families are living in the Millennium Hotel in the 
village," he says, adding that they cannot afford to live like that for long. 

Yet Rev. Can says he has not heard of anyone getting offers of help from 
either Israel or the Palestinian Authority. 

Bishop Nikiphoros, a monk at the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate, cautions 
against polemics.  Speaking personally, he says blaming this or that 
authority or militant group will do little to solve the Christian community's 
problems.  Although the Latin Patriarch, Monsignor Michel Sabbah, only last 
week issued a call for Israeli and Palestinian guns to be trained on 
churches, if need be, rather than on families and homes, the idea was to 
point up the church's opposition to all violent measures, rather than 
engagement with this or that side in the Arab-Israeli conflict. 

"It takes two to tango and there has to be an end to violence on both sides," 
says Father Sellors.  He says he does not believe there will be real peace, 
"until there is mutual respect and mutual recognition of human dignity and 
the worth of human life."  

Meanwhile, says Rev. Can, "we, as Christians, must continually ask that those 
who have lost their property and well-being not to be forgotten."

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